Anderson Cooper speaks to Israeli foreign ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor about the diplomatic efforts between Israel and Hamas.
When Anderson asks him about tonight's rumors of a possible cease-fire Palmor responds, "I can't say because obviously, while negotiations are going on, we're not going to disclose any details."

Palmor tells Anderson that Israel has tried to "explore diplomatic ways" by filing official complaints with the UN Security council. He explains, "as that didn't work, we had to use the army; we had to launch the operation." Then Palmor adds, "if there's a diplomatic possibility to stop rocket fire through some sort of arrangement or agreement or anything of the sort, then of course, we will not shun it. We will try to explore that."

When Anderson asks the spokesman to describe Israel's minimum requirements for a peace deal, Palmor replies, "The firing of rockets needs to stop, and it needs to stop for a long time, and there need to be many guarantees for that of course." He adds, "We are still willing to discuss, and to negotiate with the Palestinian Authority a peace deal. We are willing to talk any time without preconditions. And this situation, this conflict in Gaza, has not changed that fundamental position."

Yigal Palmor explains, "Now how exactly to do that, that's a tough question...what happens behind the scenes stays behind the scenes. Until we see an agreement that we can all come out with, I would rather not talk about details about conditions about requests and so on."

soundoff(3 Responses)

I worked in Hebron as a human rights accompaniment worker in the late 90s. It's so easy to see this conflict as a tit-for-tat story of back and forth missiles. I am so sorry for the people of Gaza, as well as the Israelis who are experiencing rocket attacks. However, another picture of the daily drudgery and danger of being occupied might emerge from following the nonviolent resistance of the Palestinian people of Bi'lin who are protecting their olive groves and land from Israeli takeover. It would be ogod to see mainstream US media take a good long look at this story and the intentions behind it.

November 20, 2012 at 10:43 pm |

Bob

This time, the palestinian extremists started shooting rockets into Israel, with weapons from Iran. Everyone knows that for every one Israeli that dies, 100 will die on the palestinian side. The palestinian moderates must take away the weapons from the palestinian extremists, to stop this conflict. If the palestinian moderates fail to take away the weapons from the palestinian extremists, then Israel will invade Gaza and take away the weapons from the palestinian extremists. Everyone knows that in the last intifada, when Israel invaded Gaza, thousands of palestinians died, and dozens of israelis died. THE KEY TO STOP THIS IS THE PALESTINIAN MODERATES...